Fight against corruption: SERAP drags Bola Tinubu to court
… accuses Nigeria’s President of failing to probe missing $2.1bn, N3.1trn subsidy payments
By PHC Telegraph
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been dragged to court to explain the reason why his administration which is less than a month old has not launched a probe into the alleged disappearance of trillions of naira belonging to the Nigerian people that are associated with the petroleum subsidy regime.
According to emerging facts, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) which filed the suit on Friday said the President has failed to investigate the alleged loss of $2.1 billion and N3.1 trillion budgeted for fuel subsidy payments.
The organisation claimed that the said funds that are reportedly unaccounted for were set aside for subsidy payments between 2016 and 2019.
In the suit filed by its lawyers, Kolawole Oluwadare, Ms Adelanke Aremo, Ms Valentina Adegoke, and Ayomide Johnson, SERAP declared, “There will be no economic growth or sustainability without accountability for the human rights crimes.
SERAP drags President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to court in Lagos State for failing to recover alleged missing funds frittered away by past governments.
“Poor and socio-economically vulnerable Nigerians should not be made to continue to pay the price for the stealing of the country’s oil wealth while state and non-state actors pocket public funds.
“Investigating and prosecuting the allegations, and recovering any missing public funds would serve the public interest, ensure justice and accountability, and end the entrenched impunity of perpetrators.”
Incidentally, SERAP is relying on detailed information neatly provided in annual reports forwarded by the office of the Auditor-General of the Federation between 2016 and 2019.
The pressure group which is in the forefront of the fight to bring down corruption in the country is seeking an order of mandamus in suit number FHC/L/CS/1107/23 compelling “President Tinubu to promptly probe allegations that USD$2.1 billion and N3.1 trillion public funds are missing and unaccounted for between 2016 and 2019.”
It is equally seeking an order to compel President Tinubu to direct the anti-corruption agencies to promptly probe fuel subsidy payments made since the return of democracy in 1999 in a bid to name, shame and prosecute suspected perpetrators, and recover proceeds of crimes.
Similarly, SERAP is further asking the Federal High Court for “an order of mandamus to direct and compel President Tinubu to use any recovered proceeds of crime as palliatives to address the impact of the subsidy removal on poor Nigerians…”
It notes in the suit that “The allegations that US$2.1 billion and N3.1 trillion of public funds are missing and unaccounted amount to a fundamental breach of national anticorruption laws” and what it says is “the country’s international obligations under the UN Convention against Corruption to which Nigeria is a state party.”
“The Tinubu government”, SERAP insists, “has constitutional and international legal obligations to get to the bottom of these allegations and ensure accountability for these serious crimes against the Nigerian people.”
“Directing and compelling President Tinubu to promptly probe, name and shame and bring to justice the perpetrators and to recover any missing public funds would advance the right of Nigerians to restitution, compensation and guarantee of non-repetition”, SERAP emphasized.
SERAP is further arguing that, “Allegations of corruption in fuel subsidy payments suggest that the poor have rarely benefited from the use and management of the payments.”